


with the darkness fed

by Rena



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-26
Updated: 2012-12-26
Packaged: 2017-11-22 12:56:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/610062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rena/pseuds/Rena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It takes him several tries to dial the right number; his hands are slippery with blood (warm and sticky and bright red) and his entire body is shaking with the aftermath of puking his guts out, his breath is burning in his lungs and the phone keeps eluding his grasp.</p>
            </blockquote>





	with the darkness fed

**** ****

It takes him several tries to dial the right number; his hands are slippery with blood (warm and sticky and bright red) and his entire body is shaking with the aftermath of puking his guts out, his breath is burning in his lungs and the phone keeps eluding his grasp.

Stiles is bleeding and trembling and also in the middle of fucking nowhere, and his options are limited.

He wishes Scott would’ve answered the phone, but he should’ve known better than to get his hopes up. He’s not mad. He knows Scott’s never really available when he’s out with Isaac doing wolf-y things and searching for Boyd and Erica (never mind that they’ve been gone for weeks), and even if he were, he’d be too far away to get here quickly. Isaac and Scott have been following a trail heading east for a couple of days and they’re at least half a day’s trip away from Beacon Hills.

Stiles doesn’t have that long.

It’s in times like these that he laments having only one real friend. He’s fine with having Scott, has never needed more friends than the guy he’s been spending all his time with since he accepted and actually ate Stiles’ mud pie at age four, but now? Now this sucks balls.

He can’t call Scott, and he can’t call Mrs. McCall, because Melissa might be in the knows about all the supernatural crap going on in her hometown and she could even provide the medical assistance which he urgently needs, but she’d also insist on taking him to the hospital and calling his dad, which, _no._ Stiles won’t be the reason his dad has a heart attack, thank you very much. He can’t call Allison, because they’re not talking anymore since she and Scott broke up for good after the clusterfuck that was the kanima/Gerard debacle, and he can’t call Lydia, because as fabulous as she is, he thinks she’s been traumatised enough and he doesn’t want to add to her PTSD. Danny might be willing to pick him up, because Danny might not like him very much and not put up with his shit, but he’s also secretly a saint who’d agree to help him if Stiles managed to convince him that he’s in dire straits. However, there’s no way Danny won’t ask questions and drive him straight to the hospital, which, again, would lead to his father finding out.

That leaves him with one option only.

Stiles scowls at his phone like it is responsible for him having to call the one person he wants to talk to least of all people in his contact list and hits the green button.

To his credit, Derek picks up on the second ring. “What.”

Stiles wants to tell him to work on his social skills, but he makes the mistake of shifting his body a little and has to bite back the scream that fights its way up his throat. He clamps down on it as fast as he can, but Derek must’ve heard his strangled gasp, because his follow-up question comes like a shot. “Stiles, what happened?”

Stiles really appreciates that Derek is quick on the uptake. It’s one of his better qualities, along with brooding and looking really good in leather. Admittedly, Stiles hasn’t talked to Derek in weeks and Derek has made it very clear that he doesn’t want Stiles calling him unless the world is falling to pieces, so jumping to the right conclusion isn’t much of a stretch.

“Stiles,” Derek says, apparently irritated by the long pause, “where are you?” He almost sounds _concerned,_ but that might just be Stiles’ dizzy mind playing tricks on him.

“Uh,” Stiles says intelligently. His tongue feels like a mouldy washcloth sticking to his palate rather than a functioning articulator. The black spots dancing on the edge of his vision don’t exactly help him focus on forming words. “Dunno. Preserve...somewhere.” He looks around for anything that might help him narrow down his position, when a spot of bright, ugly metallic blue catches his eye. “I can see my jeep,” he says. “Can’t be too far off the road to your house.” He swallows. “I don’t think I can reach it, though, and I doubt I’d be fit to drive.”

Understatement of the century, but it’s not like he has to tell Derek that. He can hear a door slam, and then the sound of a motor revving up.

“I’ll be there in ten,” Derek promises, and Stiles violently suppresses a snort. Derek’s taken to living in a motel on the edge of town, and he’ll have to break every traffic regulation known to men to make it here in ten minutes. Strangely, though, Stiles believes every word he says. “Keep talking to me.”

Stiles blinks. “What?” He might’ve lost more blood than he initially thought, because there is no way Derek Hale just told him to keep talking.

“Stiles,” Derek snaps, “you need to stay awake, do you understand me? Do _not_ pass out.”

That makes sense, Stiles thinks hazily, and proceeds to tell Derek so. He might also lecture him on traffic regulations and how it won’t help either of them if his father makes him pull over for speeding when he hears the distinct sound of screeching tires, and maybe he goes on a tangent on fast cars which might lead him to Jackson and how much of an asshole he is to disappear and leave Lydia behind at this point in time. He’s not entirely sure. All he knows that, maybe ten minutes or maybe ten hours after calling Derek, there’s a warm hand plucking the phone from his hand and cupping his cheek.

“Jesus Christ, Stiles,” Derek breathes, taking in the mess in front of him.

“Oh,” Stiles mumbles. “You’re here.”

“Of course I am, you asked me to.”  Derek’s hands are red now, too. Stiles hadn’t noticed he’d pressed them again the deep cut in his side, trying to still the bleeding. “You idiot, you should’ve called an ambulance.”

“No,” Stiles protests weakly as Derek picks him up like he weighs nothing and it’s probably a good thing Stiles is beyond noticing the pain right now, otherwise he’d scream. “They would’ve called dad.”

“If you think I’m taking you to Deaton you’re delusional.”

Stiles panics. “No no no no no you can’t-“

“You think your dad will be upset when he sees you in the hospital? Well, think about how devastated he’ll be if you die just because you’re too fucking stubborn.”

Stiles snaps his mouth shut and decides he hates Derek for speaking out hard truths. And then he doesn’t think much about anything else, ‘cause suddenly he’s in a car and the world’s flying by outside and he hears frantic voices and he keeps losing bits and pieces of time, and then the darkness takes him.

**∞**

He comes to to the steady beating of a heart monitor and the smell distinct trenchant smell of disinfectant and urine that’s been etched into his brain since his mother died. He blinks his eyes open, which is harder than it should be, and tries to focus on the shadow beside his bed

“Dad?” he croaks.

The Sheriff is on his feet and by his side in an instant. “Oh God, Stiles.” He sounds so relieved that Stiles wants to puke from the guilt weighing heavy on his chest.

“What happened?” he asks. His memory is still fuzzy at the edges, and it keeps skirting away from him whenever he tries to catch it. He immediately regrets asking, though, because his father looks like he swallowed a lemon.

“Apparently,” he says darkly, and clearly doesn’t believe a single word of what he’s saying, “you drove out into the preserve to take a stroll and managed to impale yourself on a very sharp branch that just happened to be lying around. Derek Hale found you while on his way to his property and brought you here.”

“Oh my God,” Stiles says, “you didn’t arrest him, did you?”

“Only because I couldn’t prove anything.” The Sheriff scrutinises him. “Anything you want to tell me?”

Stiles shakes his head. “No.”

“Not even why your cell phone listed Derek Hale as contact in the outgoing calls?”

“Is it even legal for you to interrogate me so shortly after nearly dying?” Stiles asks, and on any other day he’d feel ashamed for playing that card. Oh, who is he kidding, he feels immensely ashamed for playing that card _right now_ , but he can’t care about his father’s hurt look, he _can’t_. He and Derek need to agree on a decent cover story before he opens his mouth, he owes Derek that much, and he has the suspicion that ‘so Derek and I kind of have this thing where we hate each other’s guts but save each other’s asses on a nigh-weekly basis anyway’ won’t suffice. “Dad, I swear he had nothing to do with it-“

“Do you?” the Sheriff asks, and he sounds so desperate that Stiles wishes for nothing more than for a hole in the ground to open up and swallow him whole. He’s the worst son ever, honestly. “Cause you’ve sworn a lot of things recently, and I think you didn’t mean a single one of them.”

Stiles swallows and looks away, because wow, how is he supposed to deal with that?

“I thought it’d stopped, whatever it was that was going on with you this spring,” the Sheriff continues, “I thought we were getting better again. That you’d tell me what happened, but...”

“He didn’t hurt me, dad.”

“Then why don’t you tell me how exactly you ended up half bleeding to death on the property of a man you once accused of multiple murders?”

“I-“  He bites his tongue.

After a minute or so of heavy silence, his father sighs and gets up. “I’m gonna go and tell the doctors you’re awake,” he says. He looks and sounds older and more tired than Stiles has ever seen him.

When the door falls shut behind him, Stiles leans back on his pillow and doesn’t stop the tears from streaming down his face. He’s officially the world’s worst son, and he can’t fight the weight pressing down on his lungs, can’t breathe, can’t –

“Stiles,” a familiar voice commands, “snap out of it.”

Miraculously, Stiles snaps out of it. He’s not usually that good at fending off oncoming panic attacks, but then, maybe Derek’s presence just shocks him into freezing. That can’t be healthy.

“What are you doing here?” he asks once he’s regained control over his breathing, side-eyeing the alpha perched on the edge of his bed, too close for him to be entirely comfortable.

“What does it look like?”

“It looks like you’ll get arrested when my father finds you in here,” Stiles points out.

“Same old, then,” Derek says dryly. “I’m nothing if not used to you getting me thrown into jail.”

“Oh my God, don’t even joke about this!” There isn’t a worse time for Derek to suddenly decide he has a sense of humour, especially when it makes Stiles feel really bad about everything he and Scott have said about and done to him.

Derek shrugs and glances toward the door. “You father is worried about you.”

“Yeah thanks I hadn’t noticed,” Stiles snaps.

Derek just raises an eyebrow at him and waits until he has gotten a grip on himself again. Sometimes he can almost appreciate Derek. He’s kind of an asshole, and also sort of shitty at being an alpha, but for all that he tries to look intimidating he has a surprising amount of patience for bullshitting, annoying teenagers.

“So what’s our story?”

Derek’s eyebrows turn judgmental. “I think you should tell him.”

“No,” Stiles hisses so viciously that a sharp pain flashes through his abdomen, cutting through the heavy curtain of pain-killer induced peace. “No.”

There’s a hand on his shoulder. Stiles doesn’t know how – or when – it got there. “Stiles,” Derek says, voice low and melodic and surprisingly gentle. His voice always surprises Stiles; it’s not gruff and deep enough to fit his raggedly handsome looks. “Calm down.”

And Stiles wants to calm down, okay, he wants to do so desperately, but it’s not like his psyche has an off switch, and right now his subconscious is providing his mind with copious amounts of evidence why calming the fuck down is not within spitting distance. His mind is reeling with pictures of blood and maimed bodies and the look of betrayal on his father’s face and Lydia’s screams and walls coming down on him and he can’t, he can’t-

The grip on his shoulder intensifies to the point of being painful. Stiles latches onto the sensation like it’s a sheet anchor and follows the faint, echo-like sounds reverberating in his ear until he understands them. _Breathe with me, come on, Stiles, breathe, in, out, again, in-_

Stiles for once does as he’s told and focuses on breathing.

An eternity later, Derek moves away from him. Stiles doesn’t miss the warm, solid presence by his side. He doesn’t.

“You’re good at this,” he realises quietly. “Why are you good at this?” Most people would run about like headless chicken when faced with someone on the verge of a panic attack, not keep their calm and know exactly what to do.

It’s more of a rhetorical question; he really doesn’t expect an answer, because the day Derek voluntarily reveals information that isn’t absolutely vital to their survival is the day hell freezes over, but a haunted look ghosts over Derek’s features for a second before it’s gone and he looks away before he speaks. “I-“ he clears his throat. “My little sister. She used to get them all the time.”

“Oh,” Stiles says, stupidly. Because what else is he supposed to say?

Are they having a  moment? He thinks they might be having a moment.

Fortunately, Derek breaks whatever the hell this is before Stiles can quietly freak out. “I meant it, though,” he says. “You should tell him.”

“No.”

“Don’t be daft,” Derek says. “You can’t protect everyone, and especially not him, not if you keep getting involved. He could do a better job protecting himself if he knew what he was up against.”

“I don’t think he’d like you any better or be more forgiving of your shit if he knew,” Stiles tells him. “And he’d be 100 per cent more likely to shoot you with bullets that can actually hurt you.”

“I know,” Derek replies and moves to stand up. “But at least I wouldn’t feel responsible for breaking yet another thing.”

Stiles....stares. A little. Okay, maybe a lot. So much, in fact, that Derek’s halfway out of the room when he finds his ability for speak again. “Wow, you have so many issues.”

“Thanks, I wasn’t aware.”

“I don’t think this is something that’s on you.”

“Isn’t it?” Derek asks. The words come out so calmly and matter-of-factly, that Stiles can’t help but wonder how much time Derek spent convincing himself he isthe reason everything around him withers and dies.

“Duh, no. Everything went to hell in a handbasket when Peter mauled Scott, but that’s hardly your fault,“ – Derek’s face does this funny little twist, sharp and bitter, a look Stiles can’t decipher right now but files away for further inspection – “and it’s my decision to keep this to myself, so in the end I only have myself to blame for...this,” he says, waving his hand around in what he hopes is an all-compassing gesture.

Derek’s eyebrows heartily disagree, it would seem, but he nods tersely. “Your dad’s coming down the corridor with Melissa and Scott,” he announces. “No time like the present.” He opens the door a little farther, pauses, turns back. “If you don’t tell him soon, I will.”

“Why would you-“

“I’d like to be able to fix something for a change,” Derek says quietly.

“You can’t” Stiles surges up. “You can’t or I-“

“Or what?” Derek rolls his eyes. “You’ll hate me five-ever?” Which – where did he even pick up on internet speak? _What_? “You already do that.”

“I was thinking more along the lines of ‘I’ll kill you’,” Stiles retorts.

Derek quirks a small, bitter smile. “Get in line, then.”

He’s out of the door before Stiles can find a comeback to this. About half a minute later, the door opens again with a loud creak, and Scott, his mom and Stiles’ father walk in, all looking varying degrees of concerned, uncomfortable and tense. Stiles makes his decision before his dad can ask him if that was really Derek Hale he just saw walking away from his son’s sickbed. He glances at Scott, who draws in a deep breath and nods.

Fix things. He can do this. He can.

“I think,” he says, and silently swears to kick Derek’s ass the next time he sees him, “you should sit down.”

 


End file.
